It seems there’s a difference in sentiment on blogs, social media, and office meetings since the beginning of the 2020 pandemic to about 8 months later, and will continue to evolve.
Work from home was interesting for those lucky enough to keep their jobs at the beginning of the pandemic. Teams figuring out the best way to communicate, single people trying to be productive by “reading more”, and families juggling between their kids schooling and their own jobs.
As Walzay embarks on a journey of finding experienced tech talent and qualified companies from around the world, we collect data, insights, and hear stories of how the teams are functioning in this remote world.
Predictions: Remote or Home?
Firstly, we need to remember we’re currently living through a global pandemic. Remote working, post-covid, will be different than it is now. There will be travel, open restaurants, pop up offices, co-working shops, team meets and retreats, and maybe the kids will be back at school.
There are pros and cons to each that we cannot deny: distributed global teams, more innovation as teams are built on passion over geography. More opportunity unlocked from all over the world for companies and talent.
Then there is the social aspect; will we thrive more when we are surrounded by people in a social setting, and having day-to-day face time with our colleagues. That data is yet to prove that theory.
The truth is that some teams simply cannot move to a remote role, while some, like engineering and technical teams are easily able to adjust. So the answer to this debate is: BOTH.
Tech Teams:
Let’s focus on the obvious, tech teams have a long history of being remote. This is the first team in any company that can be fully remote from the start. These teams will likely never go back to the office.
So creating a culture of remote for a company can start with the engineer teams. They usually have tools, systems, and experiences built out to support a remote team. Start with your software engineers, mobile developers, data scientists, designers, and product managers. Use their processes to help build out a remote culture for the rest of the company.
Allow flexibility: some teams can be in the office full time, some flexible, they can choose to be in the office or not.
Salaries:
Companies don’t decrease your pay if you’re working from home from a specific location, however your pay may decrease if you choose to move out of a big city. Walzay is working on changing this over the decade to be a more pay for skills, rather than location model. This can allow even more flexibility for people and especially families to move around without the risk of a huge pay cut.
Overall — The debate is still up in the air, and we will need data to prove which one is more efficient. The world is changing and a company that does not offer flexible policies will suffer when it comes to competing for tech talent.
